Brandon Leuallen, The Business Times 

Heading into the holidays, retail-theft arrests in Grand Junction are up 21 percent this year, according to Grand Junction Police Department data.

Why Is Retail Theft On The Rise?

Commander Sean Crocker of the Grand Junction Police Department said he believes factors contributing to the rise in retail theft include the economy and people falling on hard times.

He also mentioned a lot of large retailers have significantly backed off their loss-prevention policies because of employees getting hurt when a shoplifter physically resists an attempt to stop the thief from going out the door with merchandise.

When shoplifters know a store won’t try to stop them, they become emboldened. But rather than accept greater losses in the name of employee safety, Crocker thinks retail stores should just pick up the phone and call the police. He emphasized the police department can help.

“We would be able to accomplish some of the same goals,” he said. “We would protect their merchandise and also we would be able to prosecute those people because, depending on the dollar amount, it can go all the way up to a felony.”

Diminishing Deterrents

That felony charge is another factor shoplifters have become acutely aware of in Colorado. Stolen items must be valued at $2,000 or more to be classified as a felony.

“When I first came to the PD in 2004, that dollar amount was $576 for a felony,” Crocker said. “It has drastically increased over time.”

Lesser crimes usually mean lesser penalties, which negate the deterrence effect that a felony might have.

Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubinstein said many theft cases involve amounts just under $2,000, because thieves are adding up what they think the dollar amount is for the items in their cart or their hands. If their math suggests it’s less than $2,000, they will try to exit the store. If they get caught, they figure it will be a misdemeanor.

Rubinstein said in misdemeanor cases, individuals are often issued a ticket rather than being arrested.

“So, not only do they not face a felony charge, but they are also not going to jail that day,” he said.

In Colorado, a misdemeanor carries a maximum penalty of 364 days in jail and a fine of up to $1,000. A felony, by contrast, involves a minimum fine of $1,000, up to $100,000, and up to three years in prison.

Rubinstein said felony theft charges also trigger Colorado’s habitual-criminal statutes, where prior felony convictions can enhance the sentence.

“The only misdemeanors that have a repeat offender enhancement are domestic violence and DUI,” Rubinstein said. “You could have 50 prior misdemeanor thefts, and it doesn’t enhance your sentence.”

Rubinstein added that petty offenses at the state level, such as retail theft under $300, have penalties that do not increase regardless of how many times an offender is caught within a year, as long as the thefts are not on the same day.

“You could steal $299 every day for the entire year and never face more than 10 days (in jail) on any one of them,” he said.

Where Is Retail Theft Happening?

Crocker said there isn’t one particular area of the city that stands out for retail theft. It can be anywhere, from the downtown area to the Mesa Mall area to the Rimrock Marketplace, where large retailers such as Walmart, Lowe’s and Hobby Lobby reside.

“I don’t think you can really narrow it down to any one geographical domain,” Crocker said, adding he thinks it’s the same for the Mesa County Sheriff’s Office and its jurisdiction. For that matter, he said, cities like Montrose and Delta deal with similar retail-theft issues.

One trend Crocker identified is thieves working in groups and traveling around a region. That’s why collaborating with other law-enforcement agencies can make a big difference.

“Once they shoplift something and they leave, it’s hard to track them down, right?” Crocker said. “But if we’re able to kind of get it, not really get ahead of them, but stay closely behind them, we’re able to give that information on to other counties and other jurisdictions. We have Utah just to the west of us, so we have partnerships with agencies around us and we work very closely with them.”

Similarly, Rubinstein said the shoplifting rings that Mesa County is seeing are not giant, cartel-level rings.

Rather, he said, “It’s three or four drug dealers or drug addicts that have figured out that to get to the next step, they will need to work together in conjunction to create a distraction, such as doing something that gets security going over to one part of the store, and then they run out of the building with a TV.

“So, it’s a coordinated effort, but it’s not the organized theft rings that they are seeing on the Front Range where you can bounce to five different Walmarts in an afternoon.”

Rise in Repeat Offenders 

The Grand Junction Police Department provided records for repeat offenders, who are defined as anyone who has been arrested for shoplifting two times or more in the calendar year. For 2023, its data lists 30 repeat offenders of shoplifting. As of Nov. 15 this year, the data lists 41 repeat offenders for shoplifting, roughly a 37 percent increase.

Rubinstein said he mostly sees repeat offenses committed by people who are using and selling drugs.

“They will regularly steal TVs and other electronics that are easily able to be fenced and sold and use that to get drug money, so they can go get their initial supply,” Rubinstein said. “They’ll go buy some drugs and sell some of them to make enough profit to feed their habit for a while.” 

The criminal lifestyle sometimes means getting criminalized.“It’s not uncommon in the drug trade for them to get their money and drugs stolen by other drug users or dealers,” Rubinstein said. “So, they’re right back to Walmart or Target to get some seed money to start up again. Usually, they will work together.”

 Preventing retail theft

The Grand Junction Police Department has a few tips for preventing retail theft.

GJPD Commander Sean Crocker said store presentation makes a difference. For example:

• Don’t place the store’s registers in a confined area such as the back of the store, which prevents employees from detecting shoplifting and allows a thief quicker, unimpeded access to an exit.
• Don’t display high-dollar items right next to store exits.

Crocker also recommended communicating with other nearby retailers, alerting them if your store has been victimized by shoplifters, or a customer paid with a counterfeit bill.

Crocker said sharing information is huge for protecting other businesses and potentially catching a thief who got too greedy. And don’t forget to promptly notify law enforcement.

“It’s really important for business owners to report incidents quickly and provide as much information as possible, such as physical descriptions, so we can take over from there,” he said. “Now, can we prevent everything? No. But hopefully we can stop somebody and slow them down a little bit.”